Arthur Rimbaud Boredom is no longer my love. Rages, debauchery, madness, - I have known all their soarings and their disasters, - My whole burden is laid down. Let us contemplate undazed the extent of my innocence. I would no longer be capable of begging the solace of a bastinado. I don't fancy myself embarked on a wedding with Jesus Christ as father-in-law. I am not a prisoner of my reason. I said: God, I want freedom in salvation: how am I to seek it? Frivolous tastes have left me. No more need of devotion or of divine love. No more regrets for the age of render hearts. Each of us has his reason, scorn and charity; I reserve my place at the top of that angelic ladder of common sense. As for established happiness, domestic or not . . . no, I cannot. I am too dissipated, too weak. Life flourishing through toil, old platitude! As for me, my life is not heavy enough, it flies and floats far above action, that precious focus of the world. What an old maid I am getting to be, lacking the courage to be in love with death! If only God would grant me celestial, aerial calm, prayer, - like the ancient Saints, - Saints, giants! anchorites, artists such as are not wanted any more! Farce without end? My innocence would make me weep. Life is the farce we all have to lead. - Arthur Rimbaud, A Season In Hell, p. 23